Graphic design grad Erin Shaffer ’19 is the lead graphic designer for Rodeo Austin, one of America's top five ProRodeos. For two weeks every March, Rodeo Austin attracts over 400,000 visitors to watch “the official sport of Texas.”

I do everything from arena graphics, advertisements and national TV ads to swag, printed materials, fairground maps and signage. With that comes the ability to create freely but also help set the standard for how people see our brand. My work gets seen by hundreds of thousands of people from across the U.S. and the world. (Yes, plenty of rodeo attendees are from out of the country!)

This is a workplace where I learn and grow every day. It’s multifaceted, because I get the excitement of working in events and getting to step away from my desk and get my hands dirty. On the other hand, Rodeo Austin is a nonprofifit organization that raises money and supports kids across Texas with youth programs and college scholarships. My work gets people in the door to give back to a lot of students who also want to keep learning.

I’ve been drawn to the arts and creative visual since I was young. You bet every one of my PowerPoint presentations was the prettiest in my class in high school, too! I’m also a person who likes a lot of order. Graphic design is the perfect outlet for someone like me who craves functionality but wants everything to be fun, cool or beautiful. It impacts everyone on a daily basis, whether you realize it or not.

The graphic design program at Penn College creates a real expectation, as much as it possibly can, of what working as a designer is like. Speed problems are given out often, in preparation for tight turnarounds, which happen so much in one’s design career. Professors gave us a heavy workload, but it’s the best way to design as much as possible and have the ability to revisit designs we’ve done to evolve. I don’t see many other programs requiring a project that is fully brought to life by our own prompts, conception, creation and production like Penn College does.